The Finance for Jobs project organized a 4-day training about the "Social Cost Benefit Analysis" (SCBA) as part of the capacity building plan for the Ministry of Finance which was attended by related ministries such as; Ministry of Agriculture, and the Council of Ministries. The SCBA tool will assist decision-makers in evaluating policies related to the selection of projects according to their developmental importance and their implications for society. The training was coordinated with the Ministry of Finance and implemented by Desicio, a Dutch company, specialized in assessing and evaluating the economic and social returns of public investment in Europe.
At the beginning of the training, Mazen Asad, F4J's Project Manager, welcomed the participants and stressed the importance of the SCBA instrument in analyzing private and public investments, considering the implication of their economic and social impact. The SCBA tool was mastered by the F4J Project and is being used to determine the private investments’ rationale and eligibility for public financing within the Investment Co-Financing Facility.
Participants showed great enthusiasm and eagerness to put into practice the SCBA in their work within the Ministries. The training covered several topics, the most important was the SCBA, its theoretical concepts and method of analyses. The course illustrated SCBA modeling techniques and case studies to empower participants to identify and calculate the socio-economic benefits and costs for investment projects such as the sectoral synergies of production and job creation.
“SCBA instrument is used in deciding whether government spending or the allocation of international funds on projects is appropriate. It is our experience that the quality of SCBA depends not only on understanding the underlying economic theory, but also on specific knowledge of projects and their surroundings. SCBAs are based on the same theoretical framework all over the world, but its practical application depends on the goals that are being pursued and on country and region-specific values.”
